What a time to be alive!

I am thankful for the miracle of life.
Of being alive. For the blessing that this experience is, to experience all of this.
Don't take life too seriously, you won't get out alive...

So then, every moment, every conversation, everything felt and thought is a joy beyond compare.
So many questions, and one day at a time, the opportunity to answer at least some of them-
in what we say and where we go, in what we hear and what we do,
each action and pause a chance to be filled with an answer, a glimpse of if not the reason, then the wonder of why we're here.

In everything, give praise,
everything you do, do giving honour and glory to God.
Let every thought and action be an act of reverence, worship and thanksgiving.
Not for any fancy reasons, but because it is Truth.
Every split moment of life is a miracle, a front row seat to limitless...to limitlessness.

So much is left untapped, unexplored, because we do not wonder, because we lose our excitement over the very plain fact of being alive. Day in day out, out of touch with all.the.doors left unopened because we opt to trudge by them instead of opening and marvelling. We're here, we might as well.

Thankful for curiosity
Thankful for miracles
Thankful for thought
Thankful for Love
Thankful.

Thankful Thursday: Potter's wheel

I do sincerely hope that's what they are called. Today, i'm sadder than i thought i was and i care to be. But this is what dawned on me today, and it won't leave. There are days like this too. It's funny also, how the analogy with the wheel is relevant to this feeling.

On Sunday the sweetest girl you ever did meet, D, called me after church and told me about a sermon she watched online, and about one thing in particular she felt related to me, based on the conversation we had has earlier...She said when the potters wheel is spinning, it feels like nothing is happenning and it's just spinning faster and faster..it's only later on that we see how, unseen to us, the vessel has taken shape..

So despite this sadness and whatever i'm going through and no matter how much it feels like a standstill and emotions insist on their own picture in spite of common sense...this too, will pass, and i'll be better for it. I believe this so...i'll just keep taking it one day at a time..lol..as if we have a say in it.

I am thankful for life

I am thankful for God

I am thankful for my family

I am thankful for my job

I am thankful for love

I am thankful for lessons learned

I am thankful for a whole bunch of things...i really am..but right now, i'm off to sleep.

Thankful Thursday: I believe in Miracles...

I am overwhelmed by the fact that God does not leave or ignore us. Today, He reminded me, He showed me that there are no coincidences and that there is magic in the world. I don't have the words to describe the lessons He gives, or how subtle the connections are, but fine and delicate as they are, they have the strength to hold everything together.

It seems everything is a continuation and reflection of the thing before it and then it comes full circle and and...oh life is beautiful.

I woke up this morning and cried, just like i cried myself to sleep last night. I prayed for this day to bring me surprises and joy...and oh boy did they keep coming.

I am thankful for the rain, for people, for communication, for God, for art, for love, for life, for understanding, for friendship, for love.

I am thankful for things that do not need words

I am thankful for telepathy

I am thankful for Vika.

I am thankful for joy

I am thankful for tears

I am thankul for lessons

I am thankful for my family

I am thankful for awareness

I am thankful for the silly things

I am thankful for care

I am thankful for being able to give of myself

I am thankful for God's guidance

I am thankful for His faithfulness

I am thankful for His love

I am thankful for His patience

I am thankful for my sisters

I am thankful for miracles

I am thankful! for this day, for yesterday, for tomorrow, for prayer, for all those things i feel at this moment but can't put a name on...i am thankful!

Thankful Thursday: Everything is Everything.

If only i could get the ideas in my mind to take a number, line up, and come forward when their number lights up...if wishes were horses...

I guess i'll just pick one and take it from there. Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start and all that...except that it's not the beginning in the sense of ascending or descending order..it's just grabbing one line of thought and pegging that down. I have no idea why..okay i have a slight idea why i allow myself go off on these tangents and rant about the seemingly mundane...it's because through this, i learn. I discover, i allow myself to be guided, to be that vessel to allow the words write themselves. Like with love, this needs to be treated with respect..i guess it is a manifestation of that great Divine Energy in its own way..and as such, we are simply not Allowed to control, or try to control it and make it do what We want. That ends in failure and disappointment...and it will just go away..or we kill it and reviving it is not something that happens as quickly. So yeah...you have to take yourself out of it and allow the words. For the sake of illustration, please keep the idea of "love" parallel as i speak of the energy behind this writing thing. It is a risk in its own way, because it demands that you take yourself and your desires and your will and need to control a situations and keep them aisde, and give yourself over to wherever it takes you...and that is not something we are encouraged to do in our everyday lives. We are taught to follow rule and form and Will everything around us to be the way we plan it to be and when it doesn't happen...we leave those disobedient things in a pile over there and either pretend like they never happened, or find ridiculous excuses for why life contradicts our imposed desires.

Perhaps learning to let go and be led is what puts us on the path that leads back to Truth and Love and the stuff All This is made of and at the center of- before we bound ourselves in chains, too afraid of the unknown, too afraid to go, to be led farther than what we can see and touch...We try so hard to exile trust and courage...and Love. We write them off as foolhardy and impractical and really quite unnecessary. Look at all the tangible facts we have in place of them! And that's all well and nice...But life itself is a mystery, and what is the point living in denial and trying to escape that? To be safe? To exist, comforted by we have chosen as guages of knowledge and happiness and never wander to the left or to the right of them..even if life constantly screams at you to please look at how much more it has to offer?

See...this isn't about me. This isn't about MY words and what I want to say because I want to impose my ideas on anybody. I have made this clear several times. In the first instance, i write for myself, because i am more curious than you can imagine about what i'll write down. Sometimes,  i go back and read my posts or notes and see things as I probably hadn't thought of prior. Usually though, i write, post, and carry on. Writing is my therapy.

It's interesting how there are signs all around us, and all we have to learn to do is look, listen and feel for them..basically, be aware and acknowledge their existence. It's how things don't occour before their time, before they are ripe for understanding. It's like lessons and exams at school.Sit through the lesson, take notes, get down and dirty with it...it peaks, take your exam...and then you're ready for what's next. This though on its own helps me be calm when it comes time to part with people..because that was one lesson, and there is no reason to hang on after the purpose has been served. This has nothing to do with "using" anybody. People come into our lives (as we into theirs) and they have things to teach us, to learn from us, and to point us in the direction of what is next, and prepare us for it in their own little or large way.

Back to the idea of Love and this Energy that insprires (it probably is all one and the same...it is God that IS and is behind and In everything) - in the same way as we have no right to try and "own" them, so do we not own any person. In respecting their freedom, we practice true love..i guess. To want to have a person all to yourself is probably natural human instinct, and to want them when we want them and in the capacity we want them is also something that happens naturally...as is having this feeling overpower whatever consideration of THEIR desires that we ought to have.

People are free, and when time comes for us to move on, we must let them go, because anything outside the time they were meant to be in our lives begins to be destructive. We have meltdowns, things get ugly, love turns to hate...because our selfishness won't let us let go until we kill the very thing we once loved. And i do believe that if you once loved...then that's it. It is love and we can't go back on it. If we prance about claiming that we now hate or dislike that person..then we held on too long and turned it sour..i don't know if that makes sense..but it does..it's like...what happens after "that point" should not negate the truth and conviction of how we felt when we loved. Understand that how you will.

Argh..this started out as a short post and now i have about three quotes i'm not quite sure where to affix. hm.

from "The Zahir"- "Love is giving me a pretty hard time at the moment, as you know. Now this could be seen as a descent into hell of it could be seen as a revelation. It was only when i wrote A Time to Rend and a Time to sew that i understood my own capacity to love. And i learned this while i was actually typing the words and sentences/"

I do believe, that as one writer (or person who writes) to another- this makes perfect sense. It gives you that aha! moment...or maybe it's for those who God made to find answers in words. Some find revelation through music or dance or painting..or wherever it is God has put the portal to Himself in our lives. That moment when you start writing...and it just pours forth in a frenzy...there is so much to say..stopping to try and organize the ideas often means the stream of them just stops and you're left scratching your head, trying to recall those fleeting visions, mirages of ideas, each one a dam holding back an entire ocean of a story...it gets intense..keeping the words coming and juggling those ideas so the stuff gets through..it feels a bit like those people with gazillion km/h hands working on a loom...can't dull for a second :P

Continuing with the theme of signs and timing and learning through writing...this quote- i saw a bit earlier today. The part about writing, i identified with...Only re-typing it now did i realize how much it fits my situation and state of mind at 22:20 this Thursday night. Love is giving me a pretty hard time at the moment. Now this could be seen as a descent into hell, or it could be seen as a revelation. It is only as i write about it and theorize do i begin to see clearly and am able to learn and grow, and not get angry or sad. As i allow myself write and allow the thoughts go where they will to find answers, a much bigger picture is revealed to me..it's interesting how simultaneously, in moments i feel the heat of the hell that feelings bring...and then there is the burst of revelation that makes me realize that there is so much more to All This.

It makes me smile when the signs do this. It's reassurance, it's comforting..to know that they are there and that God speaks and that i'm not entirely off my rocker :P...and in keeping with the theme of this post,let me not hang on past That Point..so here's one more quote and i'll leave the rest of those ideas for next week...if they still want to be told.

"Never chase love,affection or attention,if another person doesnt give it freely it isnt worth having,"- off of a friend's Facebook. I do believe it summarises everything beautifully.

I am thankful for Life

I am thankful for God

I am thankful for the relationship with Himself He blesses us with

I am thanful for prayer

I am thankful for understanding

I am thankful for inspiration

I am thankful for diversity

I am thankful that He knows us all by name and has individual, exculsive relationships with us, based on how He made us.

I am thankful for my family

I am thankful for love. Pure, simple, genuine love.

I am thankful for emotions

I am thankful for words

I am thankful for trust

I am thankful for adventure

I am thankful that there is so much more to life

I am thankful for freedom

I am thankful for peace

I am thankful for wisdom

I am thankful for lessons

I am thankful for gifts

I am thankful for laughter

I am thankful for food

I am thankful!!!

Thankful Thursday: Now that the Spring is in the air..

Pretty girls are everywhere...think of me, and i'll be there...

That foray into Westlife aside, Spring is in the air, and it is GLORIOUS!

I love Spring. I mean, everyone looks forward to Summer, me included because..well..it's the End, it's the reward..you know..but Spring is just...the smells, the freshness, the greenery..it's the most romantic season as far as i'm concerned..just glorious!

I am thankful for simple things, simple joys..they are the ones you embrace when you realize you're contented. You don't need more than you need. That's greed..The weather is beautiful, work is agreeable, and well...i'm just happy, okay? ;)

God is ever faithful, even when i'm stuck in the waiting room, not understanding how to proceed, i know He is there, and the signs of His love surround me. He cares, and He keeps His promises..Half the time i catch on when He's well into fulfilling the promise...but it's a fact..He does.

I have the worst all over body ache so this is a short one..

I am thankful for life

I am thankful for God

I am thankful for relationships

I am thankful for blessings

I am thankful for my family

I am thankful Yes (Prime) Minister- the most brilliant script i've come across in the longest time!

I am thankful for simple joys

I am thankful for genuine feelings

I am thankful for faithfulness

I am thankful for Prayer

I am thankful for His perfect plan

I am thankful for sleep, for rest in any form

I am thankful for the motley crew at the gym

I am thankful for Spring

I am thankful for His guidance

I am thankful for His love

I am thankful for love

I am thankful for new experiences

I am thankful!

Thankful Thursday: etc etc

I am thankful for just about everything in my life. Genuinely, thoroughly thankful.

Also, i am cranky and tired and need.sleep.now.

I will say this..beauty is from within, it is made up of those things that physical beauty can't even attempt. Chaka Demus said it perfectly with "Girl you pretty, but your character dirty"...and even the beauty doesn't matter any more. Today i learned of the ugliness of clean, well dressed, otherwise presentable looking people, and was blessed with the kindness of a scruffy looking person that on most occasions, i would be prejudiced against and avoid. God uses contrast like no one else. Lesson noted.

I am thankful for everything...

etc, etc.

Thankful Thursday: In retrospect...

I could really use a foot massage right now. And an all over massage while they're at it. Deep tissue, leave-you-half-conscious type massage...But that's neither here nor there.

Over the past few weeks i've been having a bit of a lull in my relationship with God, because i got confused over certain things, and when that confusion comes, the way i deal with it is to just pause, freeze like The Mask, until clarity is granted. I am thankful that it hasn't pushed me away, but  i cannot do things that do not come from my heart. I refuse to "perform" Christianity and say the right things with the right intonation when my spirit is not in harmony with it.

As God is forever faithful, whenever i've gotten to that moment of frustration, the one right before one is tempted to question everything, God's involvement in our lives included, He gently prompts me to see all the "coincidences" and confusing times even that have led me to where i am, that have led me through storms and brought me to this sunny place. Then i realize that while i may not understand a lot right now, some day i will look back and it will make sense and i will be Thankful.

I am thankful for God

I am thankful for life

I am thankful for my family

I am thankful for Love

I am thankful for encouragement

I am thankful for testimony

I am thankful for honesty

I am thankful for kindness

I am thankful for His plans

I am thankful for wisdom

I am thankful for peace

I am thankful for resilience

I am thankful for literature

I am thankful for my job

I am thankful that days when everything feels horrid don't last forever

I am thankful for numbness

I am thankful for distraction

I am thankful for forgiveness

I am thankful for friends

I am thankful for good atmospere

I am thankful for responsibility

I am thankful for favour

I am thankful for who i am

I am thankful for no fear

I am thankful for tears

I am thankful for food

I am thankful for this gorgeous weather

I am thankful for inspiration

I am thankful for the unknown yet to be made known

I am thankful for the present

I am thankful for the future, and all the possibilities it holds, all the ways in which it could unravel

I am thankful for communication

I am thankful for feelings

I am thankful.